HABITATIONS OF INSECTS. 441 



line, or sometimes more, in diameter, with from eiglit 

 to twelve cells separated from each other by partitions 

 of particles of pith glued together^. 



Such are the curious habitations of the carpenter 

 bees. Next I shall introduce you to the not less in- 

 teresting structures of another family which carry on 

 the trade of masons, building their solid houses solely 

 of artificial stone. The first step of the mother bee. 

 Apis muraria, Oliv. (Ant/iophora, F,, Megachile^ Latr.) 

 is to fix upon a proper situation for the future mansion 

 of her offspring. For this she usually selects an angle, 

 sheltered by any projection, on the south side of a stone 

 wall. Her next care is to provide materials for the 

 structure. The chief of these is sand, which she care- 

 fully selects grain by grain from such as contains some 

 mixture of earth. These grains she glues together 

 with her viscid saliva into masses the size of small shot, 

 and transports by means of her jaws to the site of her 

 castle''. With a number of these masses, which are the 

 artificial stone of which her building is to be composed, 

 united by a cement preferable to ours, she first forms 

 the basis or foundation of the whole. Next she raises 

 the walls of a cell, which is about an inch in length 

 and half an inch broad, and before its orifice is closed 

 in form resembles a thimble. This, after depositing an 

 ^g§ and a supply of honey and pollen, she covers in, 

 and then proceeds to the erection of a second, which she 

 finishes in the same manner, until the whole number, 



" Ann. dii Mas. x. 236. '' Reaumur plausibly supposes that it has 



been from observing this bee thus loaded, that the tale mentioned by 

 A ristotle and Pliny, of the hive-bee's ballasting itself with a bit of stone 

 previoKs-Iy fo flying home inn high Tvind, hasarisen. 



